Conclusion of how an Injury Affects an Athletes Value

Source: commons.wikimedia.org

Overall Question: How does an injury within an athlete affect the value of the athlete?

Throughout many years of athletics, athletes have suffered a wide variety of injuries.  A few examples of these injuries include broken bones, concussions, ACL injuries, etc.  After an athlete suffers an injury they work as hard as they can to get back onto the field or court.  They go through surgery, then rehab, and then back into the sport slowly.  The value of athletes changes greatly after they suffer injuries.  Through my research I have come to the conclusion that overall the value of athletes decreases as they suffer an injury and return to the sport.  

In my previous 5 blog posts I mentioned many of the most popular sports in the country and discussed how the value of a player would be affected after they got an injury.  Looking at football, baseball, and basketball I have found that when an athlete gets injured in those sports their value goes down.  The main reason an athlete loses value is due to a lack of performance that they had before the injury occurred.

These injuries are bad for the player because they get a cut in a pay check, can lose a scholarship, or may not be able to come back and play at all.  In many of the articles I read, I got to see specific examples of players that had an injury.

Overall, when an athlete in any sport suffers an injury and they come back and play they lose value.

College Athletes Lose Everything

Source: http://blogs.sun-sentinel.com/

When you look at value of athletes and how it would change after an injury is suffered you never really think about the value of a college athlete because they are not “paid” a salary.  Rather, these athletes earn athletic scholarships to play a sport at the college.  When college athletes get injured it is a huge deal because these athletes are relying on scholarships to get a secondary education, so if they lose these scholarships they will lose lots of opportunities in the job world because they may not end up going to college.  In some cases these players are so good they can make it to the next level, the pros, where they can make millions of dollars.  In the article “A Fight to Keep College Athletes From the Pain of Injury Costs” written by New York Times writer Ben Strauss it talks about these devastating injuries that college athletes suffer which end their careers indefinitely.  The article gives many examples of how college athlete’s values get affected after an injury, and ultimately they found that it hurt the athletes value greatly.  I agree with this stance because when these players suffer bad injuries they come back worse than before and they lose their scholarships if they have a career ending injury.  

In college sports the pay is a little different from the pros.  In the pros athletes receive real paper money, were in college sports athletes receive payment in the form of a scholarship.  This can be a full ride, 75% scholarship, or even 10% scholarship and so on, but that is the currency in college sports.  When looking at the value of an athlete after an injury you need to consider not only what their future in the sport can entail, but also if they get to keep their scholarship they had before the injury or if they get it cut down to a lower percentage or potential end up losing it all.  

In the article, it states that “Kyle Hardrick lost his basketball scholarship at Oklahoma after he tore his meniscus.”  In this case, Hardrick lost all of his scholarship because of a career ending injury.  He started with a very high value and now he basically has no value in the sport what so ever, he no longer has a scholarship or a potential in the game of basketball at the next level.

The article also stated that “Jason Whitehead nearly lost his football scholarship at Ohio University after he injured his neck.”  In this case Whitehead suffered the injury but fortunately was able to come back to playing the game and still having his scholarship.  Now, this does not mean that he has the same value as he had before.  His value decreased because through the rest of his playing career his play on the field suffered greatly due to this injury.

Overall, when a college athlete suffers a horrible injury they tend to lose great value to the team and the sport.  In many cases these players who get injured end up losing their scholarships and are out of the game indefinitely.

Athletes Regrets

SOURCE: bleacherreport.com

Throughout time, athletes all over the world in a variety of sports have suffered injuries from concussions to broken arms and legs.  In the NFL in the past couple of years the amount of injuries in each season has been rapidly increasing.  Why the number of injuries is rapidly increasing from year to year is beyond me.  With the technology and safety precautions that are now available, the number of injuries should be rapidly decreasing.  The fact of the matter is that these athletes who suffer severe injuries are going to be permanently physically damaged.  What I would like to know is do these NFL players who get hurt regret coming back after the injury and playing more?

In an article on the Washington Post, written by three of the their writes, Scott Clement, Rick Maese and Sally Jenkins titled “Do no harm: Retired NFL players endure a lifetime of hurt”, he interviews many former NFL athletes and talks about the impact those injuries had on the players daily lives to this day.  He found that many if not all players were very hurt and they regret coming back and playing after an injury.  I agree with the article in this sense because I don’t think that athletes should come back and play an injury just to hurt their bodies more, these injuries are permanent damage and can never be fixed.

There are many stories of how NFL athletes are doing later in life:

1. “I hurt like hell every morning when I wake up,” says former linebacker Darryl Talley, 52.
2. “I can’t run anymore,” says former offensive lineman Pete Kendall, 39. “I can’t play basketball with my kids, can’t walk for any extended distance.”
3. “I’m 40 years old going on 65,” says Roman Oben, another ex-lineman. “God knows what I’ll feel like when I’m actually 65 years old.”
4. Don Majkowski says he can no longer stay at a job, because he cannot stand for an extended period of time.
5. “The cumulative effect of what you did for a living is really not shown until age 40 to 45,” said Bruce Laird, 62, who played safety in the NFL from 1972 to ’83 and today is in need of a new shoulder.

These many examples shows how injuries can affect players down the road.  They all show that an injury today will hurt you for the rest of your life.  This is the reason I think that NFL athletes need to take serious precautions before coming back into the league if the come back at all.

Future Question:  How do injuries in the NHL affect the players value?

NFL Knee Injuries

NFL Knee Injuries

Link

Through an article called “Draft preview: Knee injuries alter RB draft values”, on the National Football League website, I have been able to learn more about how a knee injury can affect the value of an NFL prospect.  In this article, it gives statistics and examples of players who do get drafted to the NFL despite suffering a knee injury.   The article argues that if an NFL players does suffer the injury, they will not come back as good and in order to get to the playing field they were at when they were health before the injury it will take much time and effort.  The articles states that Jamal Anderson “ came back to rush for 1,024 yards and six touchdowns in 2000, but that was 822 fewer yards and eight fewer touchdowns than he recorded in the season before he suffered the ailment.”  This shows that a football player is able to come back to the league after a knee injury and play at a competitive level, scoring touchdowns and getting many rushing yards.  This story is an example of a success story for recovering from the injury, but there are also many stories that result in a failure to come back to the league and play.

An example of how a play did not come back well and had a failure to come back was evident when Ronnie Brown hurt his knee.  The article states that “based on the numbers from his seven starts in 2007, Brown would have finished with an impressive 89 receptions, 2,265 all-purpose yards and 11 total touchdowns in 16 contests.”  After playing the first 7 games and having great value to the team Brown was prejected to have a huge season.  After suffering the injury, his value went down because he could not play anymore.  This just shows how a knee injury can devastate your value as an NFL player.

Through the article they have showed that there are many NFL players who have overcome knee injuries, but also many players who have failed to overcome them.  When these players do overcome a knee injury, there value usually will go down due to the fact that it will take them many years to go through rehab and recover.  Overall, I agree with the article in that the value of NFL players goes down after they suffer a knee injury.

Injured athletes are better than ever

SOURCE: www.rantsports.com

Have you ever wondered what happens to the value of an athlete after they suffer a horrible injury? Through the article “Rate of Return to Pitching and Performance After Tommy John Surgery in Major League Baseball Pitchers”, posted on the American Journal of Sports Medicine, I was able to learn the answer to this question. After reading this article I would argue that after a pitcher gets Tommy John surgery they perform better.

 In the article it listed many good statistics and argued that more than not, a pitcher will come back to the league and be able to perform at a better level than before their injury.  The article stated that “a total of 179 pitchers with UCL tears who underwent reconstruction met the inclusion criteria and were analyzed. Of these, 148 pitchers (83%) were able to RTP in the MLB, and 174 pitchers were able to RTP in the MLB and minor league combined (97.2%), while only 5 pitchers (2.8%) were never able to RTP in either the MLB or minor league.”  This statistic shows that after surveying a great amount of pitchers who received what should be a career ending injury, nearly all of them returned to the league and played.

The article also talked strongly about the performance level the pitcher played at after suffering a UCL injury.  The article states that “performance declined before surgery and improved after surgery.”  The pitchers performances who unfortunately are diagnosed with this injury go down hill greatly because their arms can not handle all of the pressure and motion they are putting on their arms.  This is why you see guys just shut their arms down, or stop throwing baseball, when feel hurt.  To an MLB team who is paying a pitcher multiple millions of dollars, they want their pitcher to be throwing, so when the pitcher is not throwing his value is basically worthless to the team.  Once the player gets the surgery and comes back throwing better, he becomes just as valuable or more valuable than he was when he was healthy before.

This brings me to my last point, the article also talked about the performance of a pitcher after undergoing the surgery.  The article states that “after surgery, pitchers showed significantly improved performance versus before surgery (fewer losses, a lower losing percentage, lower earned run average [ERA], threw fewer walks, and allowed fewer hits, runs, and home runs.”  This is an amazing thing to think about when looking at the value of an athlete after a serious injury.  If the athlete is able to come back and perform at a higher level than before the injury, their value shoots way up.  To sum this argument up, I agree with what the author of this article is pointing out because it shows that an MLB pitchers value goes up after getting arm surgery.

Future Question:  How does an ACL tear effect the value of a football player? Are they able to come back after such an injury?

Athletes Salaries after injuries

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  Source: http://www.dme-direct.com/

  Briefly explain why you are interested in studying your topic:  I choose to study the topic of injured athletes because I play baseball and it has always been said that if a pitcher gets surgery on his arm, he is able to throw faster than he could before the surgery.  The topic also amazes me because it is hard to believe that athletes of all sports are able to come back into the sport and play again after suffering an injury that is very terrible.  What I want to figure out is after these athletes get hurt and undergo surgery and rehab, how much they then become worth to teams.  

• The overall question I plan on answering by the end of the project:  What determines the value of an athlete after they get major surgery?

• Sub questions I will need to answer in order to answer the overall question:  
• What percent of players who get injured come back and keep playing?
• After coming back from an injury, what is the average length of time that they stay in the league?  
• What are the salaries of an athlete prior to suffering an injury compared to their salary after they get the injury?  
• Is it worth it for an athlete to put their body through the stress of going back and playing after a severe injury and surgery?

• My plan of research (what specific Library Databases, specific websites, names of authors, people, etc. will I pursue to find the answers to the questions above):  I plan to use the library database, Opposing viewpoints in context, WebMD, Multiple different professional sports websites.

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